SERIAL KILLER: "The Backpacker Murderer" Ivan Milat Pt. 2

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Ivan Milat lured at least seven young backpackers into Belanglo State Forest in Australia, where he stabbed, shot, and buried them in isolation he believed would protect him forever. A survivor's testimony, victim belongings kept as trophies, and forensic link analysis ultimately led investigators to his door...and a jury delivered seven unanimous guilty verdicts. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial Killers & Murderous Minds to never miss a case! Want all 2 parts of every case all at once? Join Crime House+ and get both parts of each case dropped together on Monday ad-free. Join atcrimehouseplus.com http://crimehouseplus.com or if you’re listening on Apple Podcasts, tap “Try Free” at the top of this show’s page. Serial Killers & Murderous Minds is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios. 🎧 Need More to Binge? Listen to other Crime House Originals Clues, Crimes Of Reddit, Murder True Crime Stories, Crime House 24/7, and more wherever you get your podcasts! Follow me on Social Instagram: @Crimehouse https://www.instagram.com/crimehouse/TikTok: @Crimehouse https://www.tiktok.com/@crimehouseFacebook: @crimehousestudios https://www.facebook.com/crimehousestudiosYouTube: @crimehousestudios https://www.youtube.com/@crimehousestudios

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Vanessa Richardson?

  Hi, everyone. Before today's episode, there's another show I want to tell you about. It's called What the Fact with Connor Tomlinson from Netflix's Love on the Spectrum and Carter Roy. Every week, they take three unbelievable true facts from history and tell you the full story behind them. Plus Connor's infectious energy that'll make you realize history is the most fascinating thing on earth. Follow What the Fact wherever you listen or subscribe on YouTube at What the Fact Pod.

• 0:36Speaker 01

  This is Crime House.

• 0:42Vanessa Richardson?

  A lot of us find peace in the outdoors. We hike trails, camp under the stars, drive through national parks and head into the woods, hoping to feel closer to nature or maybe just farther away from everything else. For travelers and backpackers in Australia, wild areas like the Belanglo State Forest offered a sense of freedom, adventure and escape. But Ivan Milat saw those same isolated stretches of bushland very differently. To him, they weren't just places people passed through. They were places where people could disappear. For years, that isolation gave him what he wanted most, the space to hunt, kill and vanish before anyone understood what was happening,

• 1:27Vanessa Richardson?

  turning a place so many people sought for freedom into the hunting ground of one of Australia's most notorious murderers, the backpacker murderer.

• 1:48Vanessa Richardson?

  The human mind is powerful. It shapes how we think, feel, love and hate. But sometimes it drives people to commit the unthinkable. This is Serial Killers and Murderous Minds, a Crime House original. I'm Vanessa Richardson.

• 2:03Tristin Engels?

  And I'm forensic psychologist Dr. Tristin Engels. Every Monday and Thursday, we uncover the darkest minds in history, analyzing what makes a killer.

• 2:13Vanessa Richardson?

  Crime House exists because of listeners like you. Want even more? Join Crime House Plus and get both parts of every story dropped on the same Monday, completely ad free. No waiting three days for part two, plus Crime House bonus episodes every month. To join, go to crimehouseplus.com. Or if you listen on Apple Podcasts, tap Try Free at the top of the Serial Killers and Murderous Minds page. Before we get started, be advised, this episode contains descriptions of graphic violence, murder, sexual assault and self-harm. So please listen with care. Today, we're finishing our deep dive into the sinister story of Ivan Milat. For years, Ivan abducted and murdered vulnerable travelers who trusted the wrong stranger

• 2:58Vanessa Richardson?

  for a ride. He took each victim into the vast isolation of Belanglo State Forest, a place he turned into his killing and burial ground. It was remote, dense and difficult to search, the kind of place where Ivan seemed to believe his darkest secrets would stay hidden forever.

• 3:16Tristin Engels?

  And as Vanessa goes through the story, I'll be talking about things like how getting away with violence for years fed Ivan's ego and made him feel untouchable. Why a killer might return to the same location again and again, even as the risk grows. And how Ivan's need for power, attention and domination continued even after he was finally caught.

• 3:38Vanessa Richardson?

  And as always, we'll be asking the question, what makes a killer?

• 3:48Vanessa Richardson?

  By 1977, 32-year-old Ivan Milat had gotten away with the biggest crime of his life so far. Years earlier, he'd faced trial for the 1971 abduction of two young female hitchhikers and the sexual assault of one of them. But despite what had actually happened, his lawyer was able to cast enough doubt on the case that the jury believed Ivan's version of events and he walked free. After that, it looked like Ivan decided not to push his luck again, at least for a while. He secured a steady job with the Roads and Traffic Authority, spending long stretches of time out on Australia's highways, clearing hazards, making repairs and moving through areas most people only pass through to get to someplace else.

• 4:32Vanessa Richardson?

  Because of that job, Ivan came to know those roads better than most. The remote stretches, the highways and the forest trails. His work gave Ivan a reason to be out there in the middle of nowhere and a place to disappear where no one would question him. Between 1977 and 1980, several travelers vanished along routes Ivan knew well. And to this day, they've never been found. It's worth noting that some of the missing disappeared from places where Ivan was known to have been around the same time, including hotels where Ivan happened to be staying for work.

• 5:07Tristin Engels?

  So he was acquitted of the kidnapping of two hitchhikers and the sexual assault of one. And after he staged a suicide to avoid prosecution, no less, and now in his freedom. There are several disappearances over the course of three years that seem to surround his activity. And if he did have something to do with these disappearances, then that's three years of additional offending without any consequences. And we talked about how reinforcing that can be and how it builds confidence in episode one. But let's talk about what that can do to a sense of responsibility and accountability. Consequences are what teach us cause and effect. They're what teach us how to be responsible and take responsibility because consequences

• 5:51Tristin Engels?

  give us the direct feedback needed to change behavior, redirect blame and face accountability. Ivan has not done that yet. And the more he avoids that intentionally or unintentionally, the more likely it is he won't even really know how to do that when the time ever comes.

• 6:10Vanessa Richardson?

  Whether or not Ivan was responsible for the disappearances of those travelers remains a mystery because even if suspicion had followed him, proof didn't. Ivan had a long history of being suspected of terrible things and always seemed to walk away from them unscathed. Maybe that's why by the early 1980s, Ivan started building a life that, from the outside, looked much harder to question. At that point, he hadn't gotten into any serious legal trouble in years and his job with the road authority seemed to be going well. Ivan also started dating a woman named Karen Duck, who was more than 20 years younger than him. By 1984, the two were married and 39-year-old Ivan became a stepfather to Karen's young son.

• 6:55Vanessa Richardson?

  But that outward image of family man that Ivan tried to present didn't last long. Early in the marriage, the relationship became physically abusive. Ivan would often beat Karen, control where she went and what she did, and subject her to violent sexual assaults. At the same time, his obsession with guns and weapons only grew. He was constantly turning up with a new knife, gun or rounds of ammunition, adding to a stash that kept getting bigger. And at their home, he would frequently shoot kangaroos that wandered through the yard. Just three years into their marriage, the mental and physical abuse had become too much for Karen. But leaving Ivan wasn't as simple as walking out the door. She was afraid of how he would react.

• 7:40Vanessa Richardson?

  So she had to plan her escape carefully and secretly. And finally, when Ivan was gone for work, Karen packed her belongings and left. When Ivan returned home and realized she was gone for good, he didn't take it well. Karen had taken his control away and that enraged him. If he couldn't force her back into the house, it seemed like he was going to make sure she felt the consequences of leaving. Shortly after, Ivan drove to her parents' home and set it on fire. But this was the late 1980s. With no security cameras and no witnesses, police had no hard evidence that Ivan was the arsonist. And without clear evidence, police couldn't make the case.

• 8:23Vanessa Richardson?

  Ivan was never formally charged.

• 8:27Tristin Engels?

  That was extremely risky, especially given his history and how much legal contact he's had in the past. But I don't think it was necessarily because he wasn't worried about getting caught. I think that his need to regain control outweighed any risk. And as you said, it's the 1980s. The likelihood that they would be able to tie him to this through evidence was going to be difficult. They didn't have the same forensic tools back then. And arson is one of the most difficult crimes to investigate because fire destroys the evidence investigators likely would need to connect it back to him to begin with. But think about his behavioral patterns so far. We talked about his need for control a lot in episode one and will probably continue with that.

• 9:10Tristin Engels?

  But when he loses control, he doesn't tolerate it well. He tends to escalate and attempt to restore it through intimidation or deception and violence. He hasn't shown any regard or concern for others, even when he was younger. And right now, his wife had just exercised agency by leaving him and he is in retaliation mode. He's certainly not concerned for anyone's safety on a normal day, least of all right now, because he is concerned about his immediate objective. And that is exceptionally dangerous for someone like Ivan. He's focused on reclaiming power and control regardless of the risk.

• 9:50Vanessa Richardson?

  Does that kind of behavior suggest arrogance? Or is it more about control and intimidation?

• 9:56Tristin Engels?

  Yes, but also I think the fact that he appeared to believe he had any authority or ownership over Karen or her autonomy suggests a profound sense of entitlement, which is the belief that you're owed something you don't have a right to. Karen had every right to leave that relationship. She didn't need his permission. Yet Ivan responded as though her decision was an injustice against him rather than an exercise of her own freedom and right to safety and peace. So there's also this huge profound sense of entitlement.

• 10:33Vanessa Richardson?

  Karen and Ivan's divorce took two years before it was officially granted by the courts in 1989. By the time it was over, Ivan was alone and angry. But more than anything, he no longer had someone under his immediate control, and that was something he craved.

• 10:52Vanessa Richardson?

  So just months later, he found a way to get that power back. On December 30, 1989, Ivan was on the road when he came across a young couple named Deborah Everest and James Gibson. They were both just 19 years old and had plans to hitchhike a five-hour trek from Sydney to Albury for a counterculture festival called Confest. At some point, Ivan stopped and offered them a ride, and they got in. At first, everything seemed normal. Ivan was polite, polished, and friendly. But about an hour and a half into their drive, Ivan made a sudden detour. He turned into the Belanglo State Forest, a massive stretch of dense bushland filled with trees, scrub, and isolated fire trails. It's the kind

• 11:37Vanessa Richardson?

  of place where things could go wrong fast, especially for someone who didn't know the area or have supplies. And once you were deep enough inside, there was no easy way to get help. Eventually, Ivan pulled off onto an isolated trail and parked his truck. And that's when Deborah and James saw a very different side of him. The man who had seemed helpful just moments earlier was suddenly someone else entirely, violent, armed, and out for blood. Ivan stabbed James eight times, cutting through his upper spine, which likely paralyzed him almost instantly. Then he punctured his heart and lungs. After

• 12:18Vanessa Richardson?

  that, Ivan turned his focus to Deborah. He beat her so severely that he fractured her skull and broke her jaw before stabbing her in the spine. After murdering them, Ivan covered the bodies in brush and discarded some of their belongings many miles from the kill site, a likely attempt to throw off any future investigation. But even then, Ivan didn't get rid of everything. He kept some of their gear and took it back home, even giving some items to family members.

• 12:48Tristin Engels?

  This behavior may seem unusual, but it's actually not uncommon in serial homicide. I mean, clearly, some of his behavior appears practical. It helps conceal the crime and make identification more difficult. Keeping items from victims has been well documented in the research, and we talk about it a lot on this podcast. They're often souvenirs or, in some cases, trophies. And for some offenders, they serve as reminders of the crime, allowing them to relive aspects of the experience or maintain a connection to it. Giving those items away to family, however, is far less common. This isn't to say it never happens, but the reasons likely vary by each offender. And in Ivan's case, I

• 13:29Tristin Engels?

  think it fits the pattern we've been discussing with regard to his risk perception. I think as time went on, whatever psychological function these items may have had had worn off, so he chose to give them away rather than dispose of them. And family members are generally trusted. They're familiar, and they're less likely to question where an item came from. Giving them to family was a practical way to remove them from his own possession, but it may have been psychologically difficult for him to still destroy or dispose of them entirely, given that they once held some kind of meaning to him. So that may have been why he chose to pass them along rather than dispose or destroy of them.

• 14:15Vanessa Richardson?

  After killing Deborah and James, Ivan went right back to his everyday life. He returned to work with the roads authority, driving and maintaining the same highways that led him to his first two confirmed victims. But now, those roads weren't just part of his job. They gave him access to victims who were alone, trusting, and unlikely to be missed right away. All Ivan had to do was keep finding them.

• 14:49Vanessa Richardson?

  By the end of December 1989, 45-year-old Ivan Mallett had just claimed the lives of his first two confirmed victims. In his mind, he'd carried out the perfect murders. But not long after Deborah Everest and James Gibson were killed, a hiker found James's camera about 75 miles away from the crime scene. At the time, though, it didn't mean much to anyone. Deborah and James hadn't even been reported missing yet, and they wouldn't be for weeks. To the person who found it, the camera was likely nothing more than a lost item. As far as Ivan could tell, he'd gotten away with killing Deborah and James, and it made him want to do it again. Just a few weeks later, he picked up a British

• 15:34Vanessa Richardson?

  backpacker named Paul Onions, who, like Deborah and James, was traveling south. Ivan gave him a fake name and introduced himself as Bill. At first, the drive seemed normal, but partway through, Ivan started asking questions that immediately made Paul uneasy. He asked if anyone knew where Paul was going, if anyone was expecting him, if anyone would be waiting for him when he got there. Paul had served in the British Navy. He knew enough to recognize danger before it fully revealed itself. And to him, those questions weren't casual conversation. They sounded like someone trying to figure out whether anyone would notice if he disappeared. So when Ivan suddenly pulled over near the Belanglo State Forest

• 16:17Vanessa Richardson?

  and told him that he wanted to grab a cassette tape to listen to, Paul was already on alert. Sure enough, when Ivan reached down, he didn't grab music. He grabbed a gun. Ivan whipped around and told Paul he was robbing him. But Paul reacted before Ivan could fully take control. He managed to jump out of the truck before Ivan could lock the doors. Then Paul ran. Ivan chased after him and fired shots, but Paul kept going until he reached a main road. There, he flagged down a passing car, and Ivan sped off. Paul immediately went to the police and reported what had happened. But without knowing who the man really was, there wasn't much the authorities could do.

• 16:59Tristin Engels?

  This is not the first time one of Ivan's victims took control back and escaped. The two female hitchhikers outsmarted him. Karen did too, when she safely left the relationship. But this is the first time a victim appears to have recognized the danger that Ivan held before he was able to do any physical harm. And the moment Paul realized something was wrong, he acted on it. That meant Ivan never really established control over Paul in the way that he wanted to, and that he appears to have established over so many of his other victims. This is a failure that, psychologically speaking, challenged Ivan's assumptions. For some offenders, that becomes a reason to reassess everything. For others, it becomes

• 17:43Tristin Engels?

  a problem to solve. And looking at Ivan's pattern, we don't see much evidence that any setbacks, which are very few, have ever caused him to stop. And he's not been deterred by consequences, which have also been very few. And when his control has ever been challenged or threatened, he's adapted, he's escaped, or he's escalated. So Paul's escape right now, more than anything, is likely going to make Ivan refine his methods, which is terrifying to think about.

• 18:15Vanessa Richardson?

  For someone like Ivan, would Paul escaping feel humiliating because it interrupted the control he thought he had?

• 18:21Tristin Engels?

  Yes, potentially, humiliating and enraging. Paul essentially challenged his dominance. I mean, think about his methods. Ivan engineered circumstances where he held literally every advantage. He isolated victims. He chose remote environments. He used weapons when they had none. He targeted unsuspecting people. He made sure that the odds were stacked in his favor. That wasn't supposed to happen. Paul recognized the danger, escaped, he took control back, and that directly challenges all of his expectations. That's absolutely going to be something that humiliates and enrages Ivan.

• 19:03Vanessa Richardson?

  Despite Paul being able to tell police what Ivan had done to him, his case went unsolved. For a while, knowing that a victim had gotten away from him seemed to slow Ivan down, but not for long. One year later, he was ready to strike again. In January of 1991, a 21-year-old German woman named Simone Schmittl was trying to get from Sydney to Melbourne, where she planned to meet her mother for a camping trip. Somewhere along the way, she crossed paths with Ivan Mallett and accepted a ride. To Simone, Ivan likely looked trustworthy. Of course, that wasn't the case. Once he reached the state forest, Ivan turned off the main road and drove Simone deeper into the bushland, taking backroads

• 19:47Vanessa Richardson?

  until he found a place isolated enough to make his move. Once there, Ivan overpowered Simone, determined not to let her escape. He drove his knife through her spine, paralyzing her so she couldn't move. Then Ivan proceeded to stab her several more times until she died. When he was done, he buried her body in a shallow grave. Like he'd done with Deborah and James, Ivan discarded some of Simone's belongings in random places to create confusion. But other items he decided to keep, including a water bottle with her name on it. Simone was reported missing the next day after she failed to meet her mother for their

• 20:27Vanessa Richardson?

  planned trip, but without a crime scene, a witness, or any physical evidence showing her last known movements, the police didn't have much to work with. And once again, Ivan walked away clean. For the next 11 months, his need to kill was satisfied. But it returned before the end of the year. On December 26, 1991, Ivan came across another young couple backpacking through Australia. Their names were Gabor Noigabauer and Anya Hopshit. Like the others before them, they were traveling through the country, trusting strangers, and looking for a ride south. That day, they checked out of a hotel in Sydney and set

• 21:10Vanessa Richardson?

  out for the road. At some point, Ivan spotted them, and the two of them accepted his ride. Anya and Gabor likely had no idea that the man who had picked them up was leading them straight to a place where he had killed before and would kill again. After driving south for a bit, Ivan turned toward the Belanglo State Forest, and once he had them far enough from the main road, he made his move. Ivan shot Gabor in the head multiple times. Then, in the most brutal killing yet, he decapitated Anya.

• 21:43Tristin Engels?

  Escalation is something we often see in serial offenders. It can be due to confidence, efficiency, or fantasy-driven. And in some instances, it's a response to an earlier failed attempt. This escalation occurred after Paul Onions escaped. And now, a year later, when he's feeling ready and confident to attack again, he's decapitated his victim. This may be that refinement in his method that I mentioned earlier, because these murders were certainly brutal enough to ensure no chance that they would identify him, resist him, or survive this time. It may also have reflected fantasy, postmortem mutilation,

• 22:28Tristin Engels?

  or some other psychological function, because escalation could also be related to habituation and an increased need for stimulation as well.

• 22:36Vanessa Richardson?

  When we see an escalation like decapitation, is that usually about practical concealment? Psychological gratification? Is it pure rage, or is it something else?

• 22:47Tristin Engels?

  There isn't one explanation. In forensic psychology and forensic pathology, postmortem mutilation, which includes decapitation, generally serves instrumental, expressive, or multiple functions simultaneously. And an instrumental motive means the offender's trying to achieve a practical goal, like delaying identification, or concealing the crime, destroying evidence, or making the investigation more difficult. And an expressive motive is different. Here, the mutilation is psychologically meaningful to them. That's where we can see rage, or domination fantasy, sexual gratification, or symbolism. But the research shows it's actually often more than one purpose simultaneously. It's generally

• 23:31Tristin Engels?

  multifactorial.

• 23:33Vanessa Richardson?

  After killing Anya and Gabor, Ivan covered their bodies with brush, left them in the forest, and went back to his everyday life. Usually, after a kill, that involved a cooling off period for at least several months, a time where he was satiated and didn't need to commit another murder for a while. But after killing Anya and Gabor, that stretch was shorter than it had been before. Less than four months later, in April of 1992, Ivan picked up two more backpackers. This time, they were British friends Caroline Clark and Joanne Walters. Both women were in their early twenties. On the morning of April 18, Caroline and Joanne checked out of their hotel in Sydney and headed south,

• 24:18Vanessa Richardson?

  hoping to find fruit picking work. They made their way toward the main highway and planned to hitch a ride with a passerby, and the person who ended up stopping was Ivan Mallett. And once again, instead of taking them where they expected, Ivan beared off toward the forest. By that point, Belanglo was a part of his routine, and once they were there, Ivan had the women exactly where he wanted them. With no one around, he brutally attacked both of them. Joanne was stabbed at least 14 times. Caroline was shot repeatedly in the head and stabbed as well. When it was all over, Ivan dug shallow graves and buried them in the forest. But Ivan didn't leave right away. He stayed and set up camp near

• 25:02Vanessa Richardson?

  the graves, then drank beer and roasted food over a fire, surrounded by the bodies of the women he had just killed.

• 25:11Tristin Engels?

  This feels unusual, because we would expect him to leave the scene as quickly as possible to avoid detection, especially after something this graphic. But the reality is, some offenders don't. They remain with the victim, or they return to the scene after the fact, or they linger after the crime. The Golden State Killer was notorious for this. He lingered. Unfortunately, there isn't one explanation for why they do this, because, again, it varies by each case. Sometimes, it's practical. They need to wait until it's safe to leave, or they're deciding what they need to do next. Sometimes, it's psychological. They may be extending the experience, or they're feeling territorial. And when we

• 25:53Tristin Engels?

  think about Ivan, he did frequent the same locations. They were in environments he was familiar with. He knew what to expect, and he felt control over them. He may have become territorial over this location because of how many lives he's taken there, the symbolism that holds for him, and the advantages it gives him. That's not uncommon. Research on serial homicide consistently finds that many offenders operate in familiar environments because of comfort or confidence and awareness of those environments.

• 26:23Vanessa Richardson?

  Do you think returning to or staying near the bodies like he did this time could have been a way for Ivan to feel ownership or control over the victims even after their death?

• 26:33Tristin Engels?

  Yes, it could have been. Remaining with a victim has been documented in some homicide offenders. And one of those is maintaining that feeling of ownership, domination, or control even after death. This isn't unlike postmortem mutilation psychology. They're prolonging the interaction and psychologically the relationship, and it's also consistent with his need for control. But it's also equally possible that this was simply physically exhausting. Killing them in the manner he did, digging two shallow graves, then moving both bodies through the forest to bury them, all requires an enormous amount of sustained

• 27:15Tristin Engels?

  physical effort. He may have needed time to rest, eat, and hydrate after that, before he could do anything else. Sometimes, the simplest explanation is part of the answer also. It's easy to get caught up in the symbolism when that isn't actually part of it. And I just say that because this is the first time he's done that. If we start seeing more of that, then I would say we can look at that as a pattern.

• 27:39Vanessa Richardson?

  Ivan's disturbing behavior suggested that he believed he could do whatever he wanted under the cover of the trees and never face any consequences at all. He believed he could lure people in, kill them, and return to his normal life like nothing ever happened. But what Ivan didn't know was that soon, a discovery in that same forest would finally begin to point investigators straight to him.

• 28:11Vanessa Richardson?

  By September of 1992, 47-year-old Ivan Mallett had already claimed the lives of at least seven backpackers. And up to this point, he'd gotten away with every single murder. At that moment, all seven were still considered missing persons. Their families were desperate for answers, but there was no crime scene, no confirmed connection between the cases, and no proof that any of them had been violently killed. But five months after Ivan killed his last victims, two people out for a run in Belanglo State Forest came across something horrifying: a partially buried body. When investigators were called to the scene, they

• 28:52Vanessa Richardson?

  determined the remains belonged to Joanne Walters, Ivan's most recent victim. Then, during a more thorough search of the area the next day, police found the remains of Caroline Clark, who disappeared alongside her friend Joanne. After the autopsies, there was no question that both women had been brutally murdered. But police were still no closer to knowing who had done it. There didn't appear to be any direct evidence near the burial sites, and at first, investigators treated the case as an isolated double homicide. Ivan wasn't on their radar yet, but from a distance, he was keeping tabs on the investigation. Ivan saw the news reports about the bodies being found in Belanglo,

• 29:35Vanessa Richardson?

  and shortly after, he sold his silver truck, the same vehicle he'd used to pick up his victims. It seemed like an attempt to put distance between himself and anything that could tie him to the murders. Now Ivan had lost the one place where he seemed to believe he could do anything without being caught, because his killing ground was now crawling with police. So for the next year, he kept a low profile and carried on with life as usual. But Ivan never stopped paying attention to what the police were doing. And in October of 1993, more than a year after Joanne and Caroline's bodies were found, the case took another major turn. In a different part of the forest,

• 30:18Vanessa Richardson?

  a local man looking for firewood discovered human bones. DNA testing would later confirm they belonged to James Gibson and Deborah Everest, Ivan's first victims, who'd vanished four years earlier. Suddenly, investigators were no longer looking at a double homicide. With multiple bodies discovered in the same forest, it looked like something much bigger. Days later, New South Wales Police assembled a task force, and the case was officially treated as the work of a serial killer. They also announced a $500,000 reward for information leading to the person responsible.

• 30:59Tristin Engels?

  Ivan's crimes, for the first time, are fully exposed after years. And even though they are not yet connected to him, it's still a turning point. He's probably experiencing a mix of emotions, as many do. People often assume offenders like him either panic or they don't care. And I think Ivan is likely experiencing some fear, but the difference is what he fears. If he's experiencing fear, it isn't driven by guilt or empathy. It's driven by losing his freedom, his control, and his identity as someone who thought he could get away with anything. And I also wouldn't be surprised if he's also feeling frustrated, because his territory has been taken from him.

• 31:41Tristin Engels?

  And with that, his entire method has been exposed. People now know to be wary of strangers if you backpack or hitchhike, and that affects his entire operation. All of his advantages have now been tainted.

• 31:54Vanessa Richardson?

  Do you think Ivan got gratification from watching news coverage about his victims?

• 31:59Tristin Engels?

  Potentially. We know how central control is to him. Watching investigators search, speculate, and struggle to identify a suspect could have made him feel more in control of the narrative. Even though the victims had been finally found, he still knew the one thing investigators didn't, and that was who was responsible for all of that. And if that's how he interpreted the coverage, it may have been psychologically gratifying for him, because he still felt some element of control. And if he was watching the coverage of them in his territory, or the narrative doesn't align with his, then I could see how this could frustrate or anger him too. We've seen that throughout history.

• 32:43Tristin Engels?

  When the reporting on that is inconsistent or isn't correct, we've seen some of the offenders then start writing in to news agencies or to law enforcement to correct it, because they're upset about it. So I could see that also being the case also.

• 33:00Vanessa Richardson?

  For the first time since his killing spree started, the walls were finally beginning to close in on Ivan Milat, and the discoveries kept coming. Just one month after the discovery of James and Deborah's remains, police found another victim in the forest. This time, it was German backpacker Simone Schmeidel. And once again, the autopsy showed a familiar pattern. Simone had been violently murdered in a way that looked disturbingly similar to the victims found before her. But there was something else at Simone's burial site that immediately caught investigators' attention: clothing that didn't appear to belong to her. When police checked those items against missing person reports, they realized they belonged to another missing German backpacker,

• 33:45Vanessa Richardson?

  Anya Hopshit. It made police theorize that she might be close by too. Just three days later, police found her. Anya and her boyfriend, Gabor, were found buried nearby. For the local community, the news was terrifying, because it meant that Belanglo State Forest had been used again and again by the same killer. Investigators knew they couldn't waste any more time, so they started using something called link analysis technology to sort through thousands of scattered details about the scenes, the victims, the roads, and similarities between murders. The technology wasn't meant to solve the case on its own. Instead, it was supposed to help investigators see patterns that might have been missed,

• 34:29Vanessa Richardson?

  patterns that could point them toward the type of person they were looking for. And from that analysis, a clearer picture began to emerge. Investigators believed the killer was likely local, had access to a four-wheel-drive vehicle, owned guns, and knew Australia's road system extremely well. Eventually, that process helped them narrow a massive pool of possible suspects down to just 32 people. And Ivan Milat was one of them.

• 35:02Vanessa Richardson?

  At first, he stood out, because the police already knew him. Local authorities were familiar with his long criminal history, and he was known for his obsession with weapons. But when investigators started looking closer, one detail immediately caught their attention. Upon pulling his vehicle registration, they saw that he'd sold his truck right after the first victims were discovered. That was suspicious enough for police to begin secretly surveilling him in February of 1994. And once they did, the case against him only grew stronger. Investigators learned that Ivan hadn't been at work on the days that any murders happened, and that meant he didn't have a job site that placed him somewhere else, far from the forest. Then, just two months later,

• 35:47Vanessa Richardson?

  the task force discovered another major break in the case: the old report from traveler Paul Unions, the British backpacker who had escaped from Ivan years earlier. Police flew Paul back to Australia to see if he could identify the man who had attacked him. And without hesitation, Paul picked Ivan Milat out of a lineup. For the police, that was enough. On May 22, 1994, 50 police officers surrounded Ivan's home and arrested him. Once he was in custody, investigators searched his property, and what they found was shocking. Inside Ivan's home, police uncovered multiple guns, including the same kind used to kill his victims. They found hundreds of pounds of ammunition

• 36:32Vanessa Richardson?

  and knives similar to the ones used in the attacks. But that wasn't all. Investigators also found items that belonged to several of the victims.

• 36:43Tristin Engels?

  This arrest is different from anything that Ivan has experienced. We talked about all the times that he's found a way to avoid consequences. Sometimes it's because there was no evidence, or they couldn't connect him to the crime, like the fire. But here, there's really no escape. There are mountains of evidence, matching weapons and victim belongings in his home. This is a pivotal moment in more ways than one. It's the first time he will be facing real consequences. He's facing a loss of control. And investigators now know the one thing that Ivan thought he knew that they didn't, and that's who did this. And we know that whenever he loses control, he escalates or escapes. He gets angry.

• 37:28Tristin Engels?

  And he's in a position where he lost his advantages. He does not have the upper hand, and others are dictating what happens next. He doesn't know what they know. He doesn't have the control over what happens, and he won't have control where he's headed either. So we are likely going to see Ivan attempt to reclaim control where he can.

• 37:50Vanessa Richardson?

  Ivan didn't physically fight his arrest, but that didn't mean he was going to go down quietly. From the moment he was put in handcuffs, Ivan insisted he was innocent. But by that point, police had a mountain of evidence against him. After nearly two years, in March of 1996, Ivan Milat finally went on trial. His defense argued that the case against him was built almost entirely on circumstantial evidence. They claimed there was no single piece of direct proof that showed Ivan had committed the murders. And if Ivan wasn't the killer, his legal team suggested another possibility that maybe one of Ivan's brothers may have been responsible. By the end of the trial, the court heard from Paul Unions,

• 38:34Vanessa Richardson?

  investigators, forensic experts, and Ivan himself. Then, after months of testimony, the case was finally handed over to the jury. They deliberated for four days. And when they returned to the courtroom, they had reached a unanimous verdict. Ivan Milat was found guilty of all seven backpacker murders. He was sentenced to seven life terms plus an additional 18 years for the attempted murder, false imprisonment, and robbery of Paul Unions. For years, Ivan had used the vastness of the Belanglo State Forest to hide what he'd done. But now, there was nowhere left for him to run. Ivan had taken seven lives,

• 39:18Vanessa Richardson?

  and for the rest of his own, he would be locked away. But even after his conviction, Ivan wasn't interested in owning up to what he'd done. In fact, he seemed determined to keep fighting his new reality any way he could. Less than a year into his sentence, Ivan and another inmate planned an escape. But the day before it was supposed to happen, prison guards discovered the plan and were able to stop it.

• 39:43Tristin Engels?

  And here's that pattern. When Ivan feels he can't control the circumstances, he'll find a way to escape. He attempted an escape before by way of staged suicide.

• 39:55Vanessa Richardson?

  And after that, Ivan was moved to a maximum security prison reserved for some of Australia's worst offenders. In the decades that followed that move, Ivan continued to try and force attention back onto himself and his case. He filed a litany of appeals, and in a move to get eyes on his story, he carried out disturbing acts of self-harm, including swallowing razor blades and parts of his prison cell toilet, just to put himself back in the news. By 2009, Ivan's need for attention had become even more extreme. At 64 years old, he went on a hunger strike. And when that still didn't create the reaction he seemed to be looking for,

• 40:35Vanessa Richardson?

  he escalated in a disturbing way by cutting off part of his own finger with a plastic knife, which he attempted to mail to the Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia.

• 40:46Tristin Engels?

  These behaviors are actually more common than people may realize in a subset of individuals serving life sentences. As you were describing them, I was actually thinking back to many of my own experiences working with lifers in a maximum security prison. These are often personality-driven behaviors, but they're still treated as emergencies because they can become life-threatening, and they're very serious. Speaking specifically about Ivan, we've talked at length about how central control appears to be to his behavior and how in prison, you don't just lose your freedom, you lose your agency. Nearly every aspect of your day is dictated by someone else.

• 41:29Tristin Engels?

  I don't think his behaviors are just about attention, even though attention is an added bonus, which I will get into. At their core, they can become a way of reclaiming agency. Even disrupting institutional operations forces everyone, including the higher-ups, to respond. These behaviors change the environment, even if it's only temporary, and it puts them back at the center. That makes them feel as if they have control again, and that's important to someone like Ivan who needs that and who is in there for the rest of his natural life. This is one of the challenges in correctional settings. It often reinforces the wrong behaviors.

• 42:13Tristin Engels?

  Someone could consistently follow the rules, participate in programming, stay out of trouble, yet receive little acknowledgement or flexibility. They may make a reasonable request but get denied without real cause. They may not lose any current privileges, which is a reward in itself, but they're not necessarily gaining anything either. And I don't mean anything unreasonable, but maybe a good job placement or a job placement of choice that's reasonable, a recommendation for vocational placement, or yard time, or day room, again, if they truly qualify for it. And that immediate response isn't just from the staff surrounding them.

• 42:55Tristin Engels?

  It goes from the staff surrounding them to the higher-ups. And when that isn't getting enough attention, they go even beyond that. Like you said, he went to the higher court. He went all the way there. From a behavioral perspective, that attention alone that they receive from that behavior can be reinforcing. If the negative behavior reliably gets you what you want, and the pro-social behavior doesn't, that's what we call behavioral contrast. Why be pro-social? Why do what is expected of you if you can continue to act out like that and get quicker results? So it's not surprising that, for some individuals like Ivan, that the disruptive behavior is

• 43:40Tristin Engels?

  a more effective strategy to get all of their needs met. And unfortunately, that disruptive behavior takes a very big toll on staff as well.

• 43:50Vanessa Richardson?

  Well, none of the attempts at attention ever gave Ivan what he so desperately wanted: a sense of control. He remained in prison for the rest of his life until October 27, 2019, when he died of stomach cancer at the age of 74. Even on his deathbed, Ivan never admitted to the things he'd done. And because of that, the families of his victims were denied the closure they deserved. They never got real answers, an apology, or the basic human decency of hearing Ivan acknowledge the lives he had taken. Instead, Ivan carried that same cruelty and defiance he was known for to the very end.

• 44:35Vanessa Richardson?

  But no matter how hard he tried to hold on to control, the legacy of this case doesn't belong to him. It belongs to the seven young people whose lives he stole. Deborah Everest, James Gibson, Simone Schmeidel, Gabor Neugebauer, Anya Hopshit, Caroline Clark, and Joanne Walters. And it may also belong to countless others, people who vanished, were never found, and whose families are still left wondering if Ivan Milat took them, too.

• 45:22Vanessa Richardson?

  Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next time for a deep dive into the mind of another murderer.

• 45:28Tristin Engels?

  Serial Killers and Murderous Minds is a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. Here at Crime House, we want to thank each and every one of you for your support. If you like what you heard today, reach out on all social media at @CrimeHouse. Don't forget to rate, review, and follow Serial Killers and Murderous Minds wherever you get your podcasts. Your feedback truly makes a difference.

• 45:50Vanessa Richardson?

  And to enhance your listening experience, join Crime House Plus and get both parts of every story dropped on the same Monday, completely ad-free. No waiting three days for part two, plus Crime House bonus episodes every month. To join, go to crimehouseplus.com, or if you listen on Apple Podcasts, tap "Try Free" at the top of the Serial Killers and Murderous Minds page. Serial Killers and Murderous Minds is hosted by me, Vanessa Richardson, and forensic psychologist Dr. Tristin Engels, and is a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the Serial Killers and Murderous Minds team:

• 46:31Vanessa Richardson?

  Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Alex Benedon, Lori Marinelli, Natalie Pritzowski, Sarah Camp, Alyssa Fox, Marky Lee, Sarah Batchelor, and Carrie Murphy. Thank you for listening.

• 46:49Vanessa Richardson?

  If you're looking for your next podcast, check out What the Fact with Connor Tomlinson from Netflix's Love on the Spectrum and Carter Roy. Every week, they take three unbelievable true facts from history and tell you the full story behind them. Follow What the Fact wherever you listen, or subscribe on YouTube at What the Fact Pod.